"Be quiet."

"Sqwuak!"

"Be Quiet!"

"Sqwuaaak!"

"Will you be quiet!"

"Sqwuaaaaakakakaaaaak!"

"Shut up! I said shut up!"

"Give us a peanut."

Mr. Peterson sat in his easy chair, smoking a cigar and reading the newspaper. He normally read in his study but the workmen were still repairing the mantle on the fireplace, and as such he was forced to take his afternoon's rest in the drawing room. It was plush, made for the comforts of a woman and her visitors- fat pink cushions on a spindly legged divan, a stout upright piano polished by Mr. Donovan to a pathetic sheen, creamey coloured walls festooned with oil-painted flowers and pastures and the kind of truck women go in for, heavy maroon drapes on the windows to keep out anything that might blemish a good woman's complexion. Mr Peterson himself prefered the crisp October air, and had thrown the drapes back, only to discover the windows' painted shut. No matter. He sat in his tweed and wool and tolerated the temperature.

Mrs. Peterson's parrot, Albert, sat on his perch looking at Mr. Peterson with one eye.

"Give us a peanut."

"Shut up, parrot."

"Give us a kiss."

Mr Peterson eyed the parrot. It stared back at him. Mrs. Peterson was always saying, "He's so intelligent, Robert, really, just look at his eyes."

"Nonsense," he'd always replied. But now, he was starting to see something almost human in that gaze. It made him uneasy.

"Stupid bird."

"Squaak."

Mr. Peterson finshed the article on the latest developments with the Zulu and turned the page, stirring the air around his face and reminding him that there was another reason to open that window- the smell of parrot guano was almost stifling. Thank goodness for Raleigh Cigars. If Mrs. Peterson so much as hinted at the smell of them in her drawing room again, Mr. Peterson would call her a hypocrite too her face.

She was a lovely woman, normally, younger than Mr. Peterson by ten years, the product of a good family and a strong grandmotherly presence. Theirs was a happy marriage, for the most part: two children, dinners at the opera, an occasional foray into the countryside to gather wildflowers and shoot ducks. In fact, Mr. Peterson mused, if it weren't for the damn parrot, things might be perfect.

"Sqwaaauak!"

"Be quiet."

"Give us a peanut."

"Be quiet."

It had been a gift from her brother, a ne'erdowell who didn't even have the common sense to take his wild streak where it could make him rich or at least famous. Most young men with a sense of adventure were going to Africa but no, not Byron.

"What's wrong with South America?" Mrs. Peterson had said in one of their arguments about it.

"Nobody goes to South America; there's nothing there."

"Yes there is! Great wonderful jungles and wildcats and lost cities made of gold.

"Hogwash."

"Oh, Robert."

"The only thing they have in South America is malaria."

And great bloody parrots, apparently. Mr Peterson put down the paper long enough to re-light his cigar. He looked at Albert- a stupid name for any pet, actually- It stared back at him, flexing it's beak. After a moment it looked away, bored.

Mr. Peterson went back to his paper, reading. What was the world coming to? Parrots, a broken mantle, and now the Times was allowing the most scandalous editorials into its opinion pages.

"My bonny lies over the ocean."

"Shut up, I said."

The workmen had been talking to it again, it seemed. Stupid Irish oafs. Not good for more than slapping brick and mortar together.

"My bonny lies over the ocean."

"You'll be with her in a minute, parrot."

"Give us a kiss."

Mr Peterson's cigar went out again, and he inhaled the fat stink of parrot guano. he thought briefly about goping to his club, but no, this beats was not going to run him out oif his own house. "But this simply will not do," he said, standing and stomping over to the window.

He set his paper aside and began to work at the handle- but it was stuck fast.

"There'a pretty bum."

Mr. Peterson whirled. The idea! He glared at the parrot for an entire minute, as the parrot looked back at him with one eye. Jaw set, cigar between gritted teeth, he returned to the pane.

But it was stuck fast. The stink of guano mingled with the smel of the damp cigar on his lips. Mr Peterson stood up, reaching for the cord to call Mr. Donovan

"There's a pretty bum."

"We'll see if I'll let my children hear such language as that."

"Don't tell Mr. Peterson."

Mr. Peterson's arm stopped in mid-pull. "What did you say?"

"Give us a peanut."

Mr. Peterson stomped over to the beast's cage. The bird danced nimbly back, hopping on one foot, and twisted it's head to the side. "Say that again."

"Give us a kiss. Stupid bird, stupid bird." "Say Mr. Peterson, say that again." Mr. Peterson dropped his cigar on the table.

"Give us a peanut."

Harumph. Mr. Peterson looked around for the bowl of peanuts. He found a handful and tossed them into the cage.

"There. Now say that again."

The bird used it's beak and talons to walk maladroitly down the wires of the cage, and hopped onto a lower perch. It grabbed a peanut with one claw, and placed it in its beak.

"Don't tell Mr Peterson what, you stupid bird."

But the parrot was oblivious, gnawing at the shell of the peanut. Finally it got to the meat, and Mr. Peterson watched, revolted, as it's pink tongue rooted out the bits and pieces.

"'Ere, Guv'nor."

Mr. Peterson turned to regard Thomas, one of the Irish wrokers. He was a gigantic bull of a man, more muscles than brains. He had the usual stock of fiery hair, and altogether looked as if he not only could drain ten pints and remain standing, but actually required doing so, daily.

"What is it, Thomas?"

"We was about to remove the or'me'tal glass," he said, his eyes dull with the expression of an idiot islander. "'Ello, Albert," he said over Mr. Peterson's shoulder at the bird.

"Who's a pretty boy, then, Tommy?" The bird replied.

"Why, you are, Albert me bird."

Mr. Peterson turned his head to glare at the damned beast. They probably had the same IQ. "Never mind the bird, Thomas," Mr. Peterson said. "What are you talking about?"

"The pre'y glass, you know, wif the etchings- they's in place o' some o' the bricks." He made a face like a monkey at the bird.

"What? Oh, yes, the Forresters. Just throw them out."

Thomas turned his monkey face to Mr. Peterson, furrowing his brow. "Frow 'em out? Pre'y fings like that?"

"Yes, throw them out. Now get back to work." Mr. Peterson looked at the bird again. "I want my study back."

"Give us a kiss."

"Should we keep a few then, for Mizzuz Pe'erson?" Thomas asked, fetching out a peanut and putting it into the infernal creature's beak. "She likes pre'y fings, right?"

"Absolutely not! Now, go, I'm not paying you to play with birds."

"Shore, Guv'nor," he said with an enourmous Irish grin as he walked out of the room. "My bonny lies over the ocean."

"There's a good boy, Tommy," the bird squaked as the lumox left.

Thomas howled with laughetr and disapeared.

Mr. Peterson stared at the empty doorway for a moment, utterly put out. The idea. He'd have fixed the mantel himself, if he'd known how, if it hadn't been beneath him. Well, you put up with mud if you want to build houses. "Lumox," he said out loud.

"Don't tell Mr. Peterson," the bird replied immidiatly.

Suddenly Mr. Peterson remembered what he'd been doing. He whirled. "There! You said it again! Don't tell him what? Don't tell me what?" He grabbed two bars of the cage with his fists and made to shake it.

But Albert was too quick and bit Mr. Peterson's finger. "Gyaah! You fool!" He began to put the cut in his mouth, but then remebered where it had came from. He fished a handkerchief out of his pocket and wrapped the finger in that instead. "Are you happy, idiot beast. Taken over my home, and now my very life's blood!"

"Give us a peanut."

Mr. Peterson made a growling in the back of his throat, then caught himself and stood back, suprised. "Good God, this animal is reducing me to no better than itself," he thought. He checked his finger- the bleeding had stopped- it really was just a scratch. Mr. Peterson stamped back to his chair, and sat down, picking up the paper with one hand. He looked at the bird for a second, then shook his head, determining to put the bird out of his mind.

"Give us a peanut."

Mr. Peterson ignored him.

A bit later: "Give us a kiss."

Mr. Peterson concentrated on the trade reports.

"Give us a kiss, love."

Mr. Peterson clenched the paper tightly in his fist and wrathfully perused the article on overseas manufacturing.

"No, Tommy, we musn't."

Mr. Peterson leapt to his feet, his eyes wide, his hair in disarray. He all but pounced on the cage, his lips in a snarl.

The bird spread it's wings, raising the featherson the back of its neck, and to Mr. Peterson's complete satisfaction, retreated hastedly to the back of the cage.

"Yes, Mr. Bird, that's right. One more word out of you and it's Albert soup and biscuits for dinner, do you understand?"

"Sqwuaaaaakakakaaaaak!"

Still snarling, Mr. Peterson threw down his paper and collected his hatsmoothing his hair before he put the hat on. He stared with menacing eyes at the bird, who stared back, squaking and flapping its wings at the bottom of the cage, and then Mr. Peterson stomped out of the room- a second later, the front door was slammed shut.

Albert jumped back up to his perch. amd began hopping up and down. "Give us a kiss, give us a kiss, no Tommy we musn't, give us a kiss love, yes Tommy, yes Tommy, yes Tommy, there's a good boy, Tommy."

He lowered his wings and cocked his head to the side, looking with one almost human eye at the doorway. "Don't tell Mr. Peterson. Sqwuak!"